Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. The nine stages of calm abiding form the backbone of this 46-minute talk by Ven Jampa Gendun, which opens by matching meditation objects to a practitioner’s dominant affliction — repulsiveness for desire, loving-kindness for hatred, breath for a scattered mind. He explains why stability and clarity work against each other and must be balanced like fine-tuning a guitar string, then walks through all nine mental abidings in sequence. At each stage he identifies the predominating fault — laziness in the first three levels, then coarse and subtle laxity and excitement in the middle stages — and the antidotes applied. He closes by describing the bliss of mental and physical pliancy that marks genuine calm abiding, briefly contrasts mundane and transmundane paths of special insight, and takes audience questions on retreat requirements and the role of mental versus physical objects. Suited to practitioners ready for a detailed technical map of concentration practice.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 06 OtE 1992 02 19.mp3
UUID: 7759588f-c6af-4afc-9444-f9d794ea78ff
Teacher: Ven Jampa Gendun
Collection: Opening the Eye of New Awareness 1991-1992 (Ven Jampa Gendun)
Date: 1992-02-19
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 46.2 minutes
Words: ~5,830
Who has predominant, their afflictive emotion is predominantly desire, they would meditate on the repulsiveness of the particular object. They might take a corpse or something like that if they had a lot of sensual desire toward bodies. That might be the object they choose for the development of calm abiding. If they had predominantly hatred, they might choose an object toward which they could generate love. If they had obscuration, they might choose dependent arising or emptiness, if that was their predominant affliction.
If their predominant affliction was pride, then they would meditate on the various constituents, you know, working dividing the body up and the mind up into the various elements and the various spheres of consciousness in order to combat their pride. And this would be the object of their meditation. If their predominant characteristic was discursiveness, that means they were caught up with a lot of discursiveness, then they might choose the inhalation and exhalation of the breath as a method for overcoming this. And this would become the object for their development of the calm abiding. The specific object is determined in accordance with whatever your disposition is.
For some they might even choose the mind itself, whereas for others they might choose emptiness. For those involved in the practice of Tantra, they meditate on the body as the deity. They try to visualize the body as the deity and this can become the object for developing calm abiding. One of the most popular and one of the most skillful is, and which is advised by many many teachers, is an image of a Buddha, a statue or a painting, picking an image of a Buddha. But you can also use a drop of light, you can use a syllable, any object can be used.
But some are more skillful than others, some are more useful, more beneficial than others. But any object can ultimately be used. You can use a stick, a pebble for the development of calm abiding. It’s just that some are more useful in different ways. And if so we talked a little bit how to actually go about proceeding in the meditation, you know studying whatever the object is.
If it’s a picture of a Buddha, if it’s going to be a Buddha, then having that actual picture, a good clear picture or an image, a statue of some sort, and studying it very well. Maybe you actually draw it and color it in order to become a process of familiarization, in order that your mindfulness be able to hold it that much more easily. You try to visualize it in front of you, say four to five feet. It should be a sense of light, made out of light. It helps to overcome any tendency toward laxity, towards dullness.
It should be, but also it could be a sense of solidity and heaviness. This overcomes the sense of excitement, tendency towards scattering of the mind, distraction. So you know this process of developing calm abiding is characterized by stability and clarity. You know we’re always trying to work with these two factors. Stability of our concentration, the ability to hold the object, and clarity.
Once we have stability then it has to be clear. And these have a tendency to disrupt one another. As we gain stability, then if we try to make clarity, this will disrupt the stability. On the other hand, we have clarity, the longer that we stay on that object, the duller our mind becomes, the less clear we lose the clarity. So they have a tendency to disrupt one another.
So there’s always this balancing going back and forth between stability and clarity, stability and clarity. And as I mentioned, initially we should seek stability. That is to say to have the object present and simply be satisfied with having whatever appears to your mind. Hold that and stabilize on that. If you seek too early to gain clarity, you will cause excitement, you will cause scattering of the mind and you’ll lose your stability.
That is to say you’ll lose your object. So initially you want to develop stability. Once you develop some degree of stability, then you can begin to squeeze a little bit and clarify. And you have to become skillful and it has to be done, like the fine tuning, you know, on a very, what would you say, Refined piece of radio equipment. They have coarse tuning and then they have a dial for fine tuning.
Right now we’re just working with the coarse tuning. But you have to get to the place where you’re able to fine tune your mind so you don’t over exert yourself and you cause scattering or excitement or you don’t under exert and then you cause laxity or lethargy. So this idea of fine tuning of the mind, we’re trying to get just the right tension in the mind, just the right amount of alertness. And this acts to counteract the notion that meditation is spacing out, that it’s kind of a dulling of the mind or the senses. In fact, a mind which is abiding and calm abiding is much more alert, awake, sharp than our normal waking state, than our average waking consciousness.
It’s much more stable and alert. So we’re going to very briefly go through these nine mental abiding(s) which we pass through in achieving calm abiding. And we’re going to see that we’re moving back and forth, that we’re working with these two factors of stability and clarity. And in some ways it’s like tuning a guitar. I don’t know if you’ve ever tuned a guitar, but the first time you go too tight, you go pretty far too tight, and then you come back and you get a little bit too loose, then you go back and it’s a little bit too tight, You come back and it’s a little bit too tight.
You go back and it’s a little bit. So it’s working between two tight extremes. First, it’s extremely too tight, then it’s extremely too loose. Then it’s a little bit too tight, then it’s a little bit too loose, then it’s just a little bit So we’re honing in on just the right tension between tightness and looseness, and likewise with the mind in developing clarity and stability. We want to get the right tension, just the right neither too lax or too tight with the mind.
So we’re trying to hone in. So that’s this process of working. A great part of the process of working through these nine levels is honing in on just the right tension of mind to be able to abide peacefully on the object with clarity and intensity and stability. That which prevents stability is desirous excitement. For us it’s the main form of scattering, causes our mind to be distracted.
That which prevents the mind from becoming vividly clear is laxity. Therefore initially we have to stop the mind from being scattered and cause it to remain single pointedly, one pointedly and vividly on an object. And then we can learn the techniques for overcoming the various faults of laxity and excitement. So going very briefly through these nine mental abiding(s). Each of these nine mental abiding(s) we’re going to be working with a particular fault.
A particular fault will predominate. In the first three, so there’s nine mental abidings, nine stages, levels. In these first three stages, these first three levels, the overriding faults are laziness and forgetfulness that we have to deal with. In the fourth, fifth and sixth levels, the overriding fault. But that is to say the fault that we’re most concerned with is laxity and excitement.
And then through the three remaining levels, mental abiding, we’re slowly bringing the mind to equilibrium. So the first mental abiding is called setting the mind. And this is, it’s outlined by the Dalai Lama in his book. The first mental abiding is called Setting the Mind. So the mind is being set on an object of observation.
There’s going to be the six powers we’re going to make use of. Through the power of hearing, through the power of hearing about meditative stabilization, its benefits, etc. Also we can take the power of hearing to mean the observing, studying the object of meditation. Through that, through hearing about meditation and then taking it and finding an object, being given an object, studying it, through that power the mind is set upon the object of meditation, the object of observation. So at this point it seems as if there are more thoughts than there are normally.
But actually when one begins to meditate it seems like as if there were more thoughts than before you started meditating. Some people get quite discouraged and say, This isn’t working. This is only causing you more thoughts. But the analogy which is given is that if you were given the job to stand out on the street corner and count all the cars, you might be amazed at how many cars go by. You know, you never were aware of the number of cars.
But here, you know, you specifically stopped and became aware of the number of cards. Likewise within the case of our mind, normally we’re simply not aware of how many thoughts are continually, relentlessly passing through our mind. Now we’ve stopped and now we’ve become aware, we’ve taken a look. So in fact the number of thoughts hasn’t increased, it’s simply our awareness of that number has increased, that we now know how berserk our mind really is. So the number of thoughts hasn’t increased but our awareness of them has.
So The means of determining the length of time that we can stay on the object, the way that we can if we could count to if we could the time it counts to take twenty one breaths, twenty one in and out breaths, that amount of time. If we can stay on our object then we have accomplished the first mental abiding. So I don’t know how long that takes. You could count. How long does it take to read twenty one times?
Anyway that’s roughly the time that if you can ride on the object for the length of time of twenty one breaths, then you have accomplished the first level, that measure of time. The second level of mental abiding is called continuous setting. So here the duration of the ability of the mind to remain on this object increases. It’s slightly extended. It’s said to be the length of time that it would take to say one rosary of Om Mani Padme Hum.
This is a Tibetan system of counting time. One rosary of Om Mani Padme Hum. If you could remain on the object, have the mind set on the object for one rosary of Om Mani Padme Hum, then you’ve achieved the second level of mental abiding. It seems at the second level as if the thoughts are beginning to rest. There are periods when there isn’t this discursiveness going on.
There are moments when the mind becomes quiet and the mind rests upon the object. So this is achieved through the power of thinking. By thinking here it means by again and again contemplating the object, bringing the object to mind again and again and again. This is called the power of thinking. At these first two mental abiding, we have to forcibly engage the object.
And therefore that’s why the term the way in which the object is engaged is called forcibly engaging. We have to forcibly fix our mind on the object. It doesn’t come naturally and it doesn’t come easily to be able to force the mind to fixate the mind upon that object. Also at this point laziness and forgetfulness are the main faults that we have to work with. So working with the antidotes, the first four antidotes plus the fifth antidote of mindfulness in order to overcome these faults.
The third mental abiding is called resetting. So not only the duration of the setting of the mind on the object lengthens, but whenever distraction occurs, we’re immediately aware of it and we reset the mind on the object. So we’ve lengthened the ability to stay on the object, but also importantly the moment our mind becomes distracted, we’re aware of it and we bring it back. We set it back on the object and observation. Fourth mental abiding is called close setting.
Close setting is because the meditator has become very familiar with the object of observation. That is by familiar or has become close to the object of observation, close setting. So we’re on the fourth level. Through the third and fourth level the power of mindfulness becomes fully matured, fully developed. Such that having attained the fourth level, the fourth mental abiding(s), we never lose the object.
Once we achieve the fourth level, the effect of mindfulness has become fully developed and the object of observation is never lost. So there’s no coarse excitement. The coarse excitement you lose the object, you become distracted, your mind is scattered. So at the fourth level there is no coarse excitement. So after this we’re not going to be concerned with losing the object, we’re going to be concerned with subtle laxity and subtle excitement.
Also coarse laxity too. But there’s no coarse excitement. We’re never going to lose the object again once we’ve achieved this fourth level. So beginning within being able to hold on, now we never lose the object. We’re always able to keep the mind set on the object.
And within this, there now appears, we start to work with subtle laxity and subtle excitement. And this is like the analogy that’s used is like a child in a desk at school, in a chair at school. The child is sitting in a chair but the child may be sinking, you know, child is squirming around and thinking about completely other things than what’s going on in the classroom. So the mind is set on object. There’s no problem.
The child is in the chair, but there’s some fault in the way the child is working within the situation of being in that chair. It’s not, in the case of a child, not paying proper attention. So likewise there’s some kind of fault in the way the mind is operating with respect to the object even though it’s there. And these faults are going to be either subtle laxity or subtle excitement. This is what we have to begin to work with now.
Previously the main faults were laziness and forgetfulness. Now over the fifth, sixth and seventh mental abidings, the main obstacles, the main faults we’re going to have to be looking for and correcting are subtle excitement and subtle laxity. Isn’t this interesting? I don’t know, maybe it’s too technical. Anyway, because I only know this from my reading, having been taught this, I’ve never done this.
I mean it’s like like learning how to use a computer or something, learn how to use your own mind, being able to work with it and become skillful in its operation. I remember once Lama Yeshe said that if you really want to learn about your mind, learn how to do calm abiding, achieve calm abiding. Become an expert on mind. Become an expert on your own mind and how to work with it, how to make it do what you want it to do, how to work all the dials. You begin to know what dials there are and how to maneuver the dials, to tune in to whatever type of mind that you want.
You become you learn how to operate your mind. It’s quite an achievement going through this process. It’s not easy. You have to be very skillful. It’s not something that can be done mechanically.
It’s a very subtle process. You have to understand who you are, your disposition, your tendency and the nature and the way your mind is operating. And be able to, you know, using all your skills and experience and the technical know how of the teachings, to bring all that to bear. To be able to maneuver and to train and develop and to be able to operate the mind as you wish. And then it becomes your companion, it becomes your friend, it becomes your servant rather than the other way around.
And we are our mind servant. And by mind in this context we mean the afflictive emotions. We are at the mercy of our afflictive emotions to a large extent. Our hopes and fears, but also our attachments and hatreds and angers and jealousies and pride that we have very little say so and we have very little freedom. The fifth mental abiding.
This won’t hurt too much. Fifth mental abiding is called disciplining. Because here the mind is able to abide on the object continuously. So the mind, at the fourth mental level we said, mental abiding(s), the mind never loses its object. So at the fifth, because the mind never loses its object, that is to say it’s found a high degree of stability, what happens?
The mind begins to close down on itself. It begins to over withdraw. It begins, so in this case coarse laxity arises. The mind is becoming too loose. It’s becoming dark because The mind is becoming too low.
Because it’s achieved, it’s staying on the same object continuously without ever losing it. Loses its alertness, its clarity, its vividness And it’s beginning to shut down, beginning to lose, too lax. So of coarse laxity begins to predominate the main fault at the fifth level, what’s called disciplining. So this becomes known by the power of introspection or awareness, which is also the initial antidote. So we said introspection identifies laxity and excitement.
So now we have to be able to identify when laxity and excitement are occurring. Before they were there but it wasn’t necessary to identify them because we were more concerned with laziness and forgetfulness. Now mindfulness is fully developed. We don’t have to worry about forgetfulness. So now we have to begin to concern ourselves with identifying laxity and excitement and therefore we have to have the power of introspection.
So we’re making use of the power of introspection at this point. So the mind has become down, too loose. We have to revivify the mind. We have to bring it up. So this is where your skill as a meditator comes in.
You should have all of these prior meditations worked out so that you don’t have to stop your meditation and then proceed to revivify your mind. Just a cue, I talked about some of the ways that you can revivify your mind in terms of analytic meditation. Being inspired by one’s teacher, being inspired by this wonderful chance that we have to grow, of our Buddha nature, of our basic goodness. And the things which inspire you, which enliven you, which give you courage, which you which uplift you, that you’ve already worked on. You this repertoire of these tools that you can take out of your bag.
And you already have them developed, you already have them made. And then simply thinking Lama, or simply thinking basic sanity, some cue. And you’re able to draw upon that and that state arises and revivifies your mind, brings you back up. So you have to have the stock of tools that you keep on the side of your meditation cushion. Open your bag, take out the appropriate tool.
The appropriate skillful state can be called up just by the power of mindfulness. You enliven the mind or you can bring it down by your previous types of meditation that you worked on. So here we want to heighten, revivify the mind, it’s too loose at the fifth stage. So what did we just do? Our mind was getting too dull, it coarse laxity.
So we heightened it, we revivified it. So what happened? At the sixth level, called pacifying, due to having heightened the mind. So we tightened the tension and it got too loose and so we tightened it. But we went a little bit over the other way.
Now it’s a little bit too heightened. At the fifth level, so now there’s a danger of subtle excitement at the sixth level. At the fifth level there was a danger of coarse laxity. And we corrected for that and now there’s a danger of going the other way, subtle excitement. So now again we have to bring the mind down a little bit.
Is the antidote to introspection tells us, Hey your mind is a little bit too tight, a little bit too excited. If you keep going like this, you’re going to scatter. Your meditation isn’t going to go well. So we have to bring it down a little bit. At the seventh level, the seventh meditative mental abiding is called thorough pacification.
So though subtle excitement and subtle laxity may occur, at this point they can’t harm the process of meditation. It’s not necessary to use a specific antidote. You know we’re almost at the perfect tension. Maybe there’s a little bit of subtle excitement, sometimes there’s little bit of subtle laxity. But we don’t have to stop our meditation and call up some antidote.
All we have to do is apply the power of effort. We just have to concentrate a little bit harder. Just that extra effort is enough to correct for this very subtle fault of laxity or excitement. And therefore we use the power of effort and then they cease. That’s at the seventh level.
And then at the eighth level, the eighth mental abiding, it’s called making one pointed. At this point all we need to do is when initially sitting down to meditate is make an initial effort to correct for any laxity or subtle excitement in the mind. Just that initial effort to correct for these faults. And from then on can, our mind will abide without faultlessly upon the object of meditation, the object of observation. During the course of our meditation subtle laxity and excitement will not arise.
Therefore the antidote which we make use of at this point is called non application or equanimity. There’s no need for any types of, to apply any antidote. So we remain equanimous, We don’t apply any antidote during the course of the eighth level. The type of mental engagement we use is called uninterrupted engagement. Our meditation is going along flawlessly, it’s not interrupted by laxity or excitement.
So the way we engage the, the manner of engaging the object is uninterruptedly. And we use the power of, and at this point the power of effort becomes fully developed. Then gradually, due to having meditated a great deal and through the power of familiarity, which is the sixth power, the mind spontaneously engages the object uninterruptedly. So this is the ninth mental abiding. It’s called setting in equipoise.
We just have to, through the power of familiarity, simply direct the mind towards the object and the mind spontaneously abides there. We don’t even have to make any effort. We don’t even have to make the initial effort to correct any thoughts in our mind. This is a single point of setting the mind in equipoise. Then, so we’ve achieved the ninth level.
We haven’t achieved calm abiding yet, we’re just about to. Then, and as the Dalai Lama says, Then unfavorable states of mind and body, such as our minds and bodies usually are not serviceable in virtue, are removed gradually. So we’re abiding in the ninth level, this level of setting in equipoise. At present our minds are not usable in accordance with our wish. But through accustoming to the ninth level of meditative stabilization, this unserviceability diminishes in strength such that finally an antidote to it is generated, this being called mental pliancy.
As a sign that mental pliancy is about to be generated, a tingling sensation is felt in the area of the brain. This feeling is not unpleasant, it is pleasant. And the reason why it is generated is that there is a special wind and inner air fills the body. The feeling is compared to that of a warm hand placed upon the top of the head after it has been shaved. This sign is said to occur just prior to the rising of mental pliancy and indeed some people who have cultivated meditative stabilization have reported that it does.
in dependence upon the power of having generated the serviceability of mind, which is called mental pliancy, a favorable wind or energy circulates in the body. It is the cause of generating physical pliancy. Through the winds pervading all the parts of the body, the unserviceability of the body such that it cannot be directed to virtuous activity in accordance with one’s wishes is removed physical pliancy is generated. The generation of physical pliancy in turn generates bliss of physical pliancy and a sense of comfort throughout the body. When the bliss of physical pliancy is generated, it makes the body blissful.
This induces the bliss of mental pliancy making the mind blissful. At first this joyous mental bliss is a little too strong but then it gradually becomes more steady, the element of excitement quieting down. At this point one attains unfluctuating pliancy. This is the point from which one has fully qualified meditative stabilization of calm abiding. That wasn’t too hard.
So you’ve gotten to the point where you’re at the ninth level setting in equipoise and then the various wind energies of the body cause the serviceability of body and mind. At present we simply cannot sit. Our body isn’t that serviceable. We can’t sit as long as we might like. We can’t direct our mind in a way that we might like.
It’s not under our control, it’s not serviceable in that sense. So first we develop a sense of pliancy. pliancy here means flexibility of the mind. First a flexibility of the mind such that we are able to direct it toward any object for as long as we wish. Then following that we develop a pliancy of body.
We can remain seated in any position, well, in a meditative posture for as long as we wish. Out of this rises a physical bliss. in dependence upon this arises a mental bliss, which initially is very powerful. There’s a certain over excitement with this mental bliss and then it quietens down to a steady state of bliss and we achieve calm abiding. A person with calm abiding can direct their mind to any object and remain upon that object for as long as they desire uninterruptedly and feel perfect bliss and have one-pointed concentration.
So this is obviously a wonderful achievement. It’s a wonderful tool to be able to have in developing one’s mind. Then just a few minutes, I’d like to finish off this section because this section is concerned with meditative stabilization and not only calm abiding. Calm abiding is the basis of meditative stabilization. We talked about having achieved the meditative stabilization of calm abiding, one then goes on to combine it with a mundane or a transmundane path of special insight.
So we talked about the difference between mundane and transmundane paths of insight, whether they are able to suppress or remove the afflictive emotions altogether, for example. The mundane path will lead the meditator through the four concentrations of the form realm and the four absorptions of the formless realm. Now we’ve talked about those levels. And these are characterized by more and more subtle levels of peace as working way up through the three realms or the nine levels. The desire realm, the four the desire realm has one level, the form realm has four levels, and the formless realm has four levels making nine levels.
So as you work up it’s characterized by more and more levels of peace. In which the mundane path of special insight, the very afflictive emotions which disturb the peace of the mind are temporarily suppressed, but only temporarily. And we talked about this last week. The manifest afflictive emotions are not allowed to arise due to the power of concentration. The reason that a spiritual practitioner might make use of a mundane path is because one can attain various clairvoyances such as the Divine eye, Divine ear, being able to read other people’s minds, being able to know one’s past lives, being able to know the past lives of others and where they might be reborn.
And this would be useful in working with students, being able to give them specific advice according to their past history and the nature of what they’re actually thinking. This would be very skillful in being able to be of more benefit to others. Also one can generate the four sometimes they’re called the four divine abodes of Brahma, but generally they’re termed the four immeasurable. Immeasurable love, compassion, joy and equanimity by developing the various concentrations. So there are reasons why a spiritual practitioner would make use of a mundane path of special insight.
But ultimately one must make use of a transmundane path of special insight because it’s not enough simply to suppress temporarily the afflictive emotions. One wants to remove them completely from their very root in order to achieve liberation. So in the supra mundane or transmundane path, one analyzes. special insight is analytic meditation. One analyzes with a mind of using this calm abiding, one then goes on to analyze either for example the four noble truths, especially in the context of what is to be adopted and what is to be rejected, but even on a more subtle level trying to come to an understanding of emptiness, the non inherent existence of all phenomena.
By means of which the afflictive emotions are removed from their very roots and one achieves the permanent cessation of all distress. One achieves beyond sorrow which is nirvana. Then next week we’re going to talk about the third of the three higher trainings. The special training in wisdom, in which we actually go into the special insight, the path of special insight, and coming to an understanding of the non inherent existence of all phenomena, emptiness, selflessness, and the way to cultivate that special insight into the nature of reality. Does anybody have any questions or comments?
That took a lot of concentration just to sit there and take that on. Are various figures that are given. If you have the perfect conditions, it doesn’t necessarily say that there’s I think I didn’t bring it, but there’s a book called Meditative States, which is in English. And it’s quite good in presentation. It’s said that if you have all the proper conditions, one can achieve it in between six months and a year.
But that’s with all the proper conditions. One teacher said that even without doing retreat, one can achieve the third mental abiding out of those nine without ever doing a retreat. Just in your daily practice you can achieve the third one. But at some point it’s necessary to do a retreat. Yeah, mean you take your mind.
You can actually take your own mind as an object. Anything can be taken as an object of observation. But then, for example, it’s visualized. You can use your breath. It can be a visualization of the breath or the mind itself.
But I think it has to be a mental object ultimately. I don’t think you can achieve, you know, like staring at a glass. You can only go so far. I don’t think you can complete nine stages with a physical sense object. It has to ultimately be a mental object.
This is why, for example, in the Theravāda tradition when they make use of mindfulness of breathing to achieve calm abiding, there reaches a point when the mind becomes overly subtle and the breath is too coarse to achieve full calm abiding and what is called nimitta is generated. A mental image is formed spontaneously, is generated and then one uses that. The same is true in Zen Buddhism. There’s a point when the mind becomes overly supple. The breath or the rising lowering of the abdomen is too coarse for the mind to be able to actually generate a full fledged calm abiding and so there is a light which arises in the mind.
Ultimately it has to be a mental object of the mental consciousness, but initially it can be an external object. It can be a sense object like breathing or something like that. Some kind of mental object. It can be light, a drop of light. It can be a purely imaginative object like visualizing a Buddha.
It can be the breath. I don’t know, I’d hate to guess. I think I’ve heard that until you reach calm abiding you can degenerate. Once you reach calm abiding you won’t degenerate. So once you reach calm abiding you have reached the first of the seven preparations for the first concentration and you won’t go back from there.
But until you reach that, you can. And then even having achieved calm abiding to go on to develop these higher concentrations, the four concentrations of the form realm and the four absorptions of the formless realm, one again has to make effort and one progresses through stages in order to gain those concentrations. And then one achieves like a plateau which you will not fall back from. So I think you have to achieve pliancy of body. The ninth level is okay.
I don’t know why he said that. I think there must be a reason. I had it once but I can’t remember. Yeah, that’s almost calm abiding. That’s to be able to carry on a full fledged completion stage.
You can have a similitude. But I mean, yeah, it’s really important if you were going to take it up in a serious way to get the personal instruction of a qualified meditation teacher. You to enter into it with a great deal of confidence. That you know everything thoroughly. That’s very important to have confidence.
So I thought we’d go for it tonight. We’re special. Okay. You people are very patient. So we dedicate the merit that we have accumulated.
May I quickly become an awakened spiritual teacher and lead each and every sentient being to the enlightened realm through these skillful actions. May the supreme jewel of the awakening heart that has not arisen arise and grow. May that which has arisen never diminish, but increase more and more.